La Trobe University Commits To Full Fossil Fuel Divestment

New Matilda - Thom Mitchell

A creative action at Melbourne University earlier this month. Fossil Free University of Melbourne.

La Trobe University has become the first in Australia to commit to full divestment from fossil fuels, according to an email circulated to University staff earlier this morning and seen by New Matilda.
Vice Chancellor Professor John Dewar said that over the next five years La Trobe will "divest from the top 200 publicly-traded fossil fuel companies ranked by the carbon content of their fossil fuel reserves".
"We are the first university in Australia to make a commitment to complete divestment in this way," Prof Dewar said. "We can be proud of our status as the leading sustainable university in Australia, and a leader internationally."
He said the University was also committed to being open and transparent and that, "Accordingly, we will also disclose the carbon exposure of our investments and provide annual reports of our divestment progress over the next five years".
Fossil Free campaigner and current La Trobe student Michaela Carter welcomed the decision, saying it "vindicates years of work to get the university to take a responsible attitude toward their investment portfolio".
Academic staff have also lauded the move. "I am really proud of my university for choosing to divest from fossil fuel investments," said Ben Habib, Lecturer in Politics & International Relations and Course Coordinator of Master of International Relations.
He said the decision "reinforces the demonstrated commitment of the many academics, professional staff and students across the University community to strong climate action". Vice-Chancellor Dewar also took the opportunity to "thank the students and staff that have been advocating for this change".

IMAGE: Thom Mitchell.

Prof Dewar said that the decision would not compromise returns on the University's investments. "Divesting in fossil fuels will not inhibit our ability to achieve the annual returns on investments that we need to ensure that the University remains in a robust financial position," the Vice-Chancellor said.
Despite increasing pressure from students and staff, Universities have copped flack for distancing themselves from fossil fuels in the past. When the Australian National University made a decision to partially divest in 2014 they were pounded with criticism from former Prime Minister Tony Abbott and the conservative press.
Other Universities to pursue partial divestment include the University of Sydney, Monash and Swinburne.
Those that have not yet divested now run an increasing repetitional risk as they fall behind the ethical investment pack, as a report leaked to New Matilda earlier this month reveals.
In the report, financial consultants Mercer warned the University of New South Wales that if it did not proactively begin to respond to the demands of staff and students it would leave itself vulnerable to a fast-building fossil fuel divestment campaign. It also suggested there was little financial risk associated with the decision to divest.
La Trobe University is expected to make a public announcement on its decision later this afternoon, but the news has already reached climate advocacy group 350.org.
 National Campus Divestment Coordinator Ray Yoshida said the group is "thrilled" with the development.
"They have shown other universities that it is possible, and I look forward to other institutions following their lead," Yoshida said. "Universities have a very clear choice – do they keep funding dirty fossil fuels that drives climate change, or do they show true leadership, as La Trobe has done, and prove that there is an alternative."
Institutions with $3.4 trillion under management have so-far committed to some form of divestment as mainstream economists increasingly warn of potential 'stranded assets' in coal, oil, and gas stocks.

Links

• Labor Promises To Extend 'Water Trigger' To Shale And Tight Seam Gas
• Whitehaven Coal Eyeing Off Expansion Of Controversial Maules Creek
• Call To End Special Treatment For The Logging Industry

Climate Change: Waiting For Catastrophe Means We Will Be Too Late To Act

Fairfax - Ian Dunlop*

Growth created since the Industrial Revolution depended on the availability of cheap energy from fossil fuels, but cheap fossil fuels have dried up. Photo: Rob Homer

Why is nobody in authority talking about the issues which are really defining the future of this country? Politicians and corporations create much sound and fury around tax reform, industrial relations and, ad nauseam, the election – all important but essentially second-order issues. Beyond the Australian goldfish bowl, the greatest structural change in human history is rapidly unfolding bringing unprecedented risks and opportunities. Yet our leaders are oblivious, intent upon minimising our opportunities and maximising our risks.
In the 1970s, the combined effect of population growth and consumption began to exceed the capacity of planetary ecosystems to meet human demands. To the point where today we need the annual biophysical capacity of 1.6 planets to survive. This unsustainable pressure is now hitting global limits which we can no longer circumvent, manifesting itself in two immediate pressure points.
First, increasing energy costs. Economic growth and wealth created since the Industrial Revolution totally depended on the availability of cheap energy in the shape of fossil fuels, first coal, then oil, then gas. But cheap fossil fuels have dried up. Their cost has increased steadily as we used up the "low-hanging fruit" and now rely on more expensive sources such as deepwater oil, tar sands, shale and coal seam fracking.
This was a primary cause of the 2008 global financial crisis, for once oil exceeds around $100 per barrel, which is a pre-requisite for their development, Western economies go into recession, resulting in the falling demand and low prices we see today. Except this is happening around a declining energy surplus trend in that the surplus available to run society net of the increasing energy needed to extract these sources, is dropping rapidly, making it impossible to maintain conventional economic growth, which has already slowed.
Second, our underestimation of the speed and extent of climate change, as witnessed by irreversible tipping points now being triggered in the Arctic, Antarctic and the oceans, not least the destruction of the Great Barrier Reef. To avoid its worst impacts we must wean ourselves off all fossil fuel use far faster than proposed in the recent Paris climate agreement. This view is instantly dismissed officially, but it will soon be accepted as the impact of extreme weather events, such as the massive Fort McMurray wild fire raging in Canada, accelerates. Some continued use of fossil fuels to build the new low-carbon economy is inevitable, but much less than industry and government maintain.
–The most dangerous aspect of our climate and energy dilemma is that, due to the inertia of the climate system, the actions we take today are locking in irreversible catastrophic climate outcomes decades ahead, long before we see them. Solutions require enlightened long-term thinking, based on the latest science, and a preparedness to act in the public interest; the antithesis of the blind, short-termist, anti-science, ideology which drives mainstream Australian politics and corporate decision-making. Waiting for catastrophe to happen before acting, which is what we are currently doing, ensures it will be too late to act.
We are being taken for fools by our politicians and corporate leaders as they place personal aggrandisement and self-interest ahead of our future.
Climate change is a genuinely existential issue which unless rapidly addressed, will result in a substantial reduction in global population with immeasurable suffering, the beginnings of which can already be seen in the climate-driven refugee crisis engulfing Europe. Australia, as the driest continent on Earth is not immune. We have left it too late to solve this dilemma with a graduated response; emergency action, akin to placing the economy on a war-footing, is essential if we wish to avoid the worst outcomes.
This is not irrational alarmism, but an objective view of the latest science and evidence, a view which is increasingly aired by responsible leaders worldwide. It is a matter of national survival which conventional left and right-wing politics is incapable of addressing, as recent history and the irrelevance of the election campaign demonstrate only too well.
The corollary of these existential risks is that their solution represents the greatest development and investment opportunity we have ever seen in creating the low-carbon world. But it must be a 21st-century world focused on genuine sustainability and quality of life, not on rebooting the unsustainable 20th-century free-market version which has got us in to the current mess. We hear much rhetoric about "transition", "innovation", "jobs and growth" but no clarity on "transition to what?", "innovation to what end?" and "what sort of jobs and growth?". At present, policies of both the left and right are committed to delivering the latter world, not the former.
We have solutions, but they will not see the light of day without a fundamental rethink of our national strategy. There are good people across the political spectrum capable of acting in the public interest if they can break the shackles of outdated ideologies. Time to dispense with party politics, encourage these folk to step forward and form nothing less than a government of national unity. That is what the community must demand on election day.

*Ian Dunlop was formerly an international oil, gas and coal industry executive, chair of the Australian Coal Association and CEO of the Australian Institute of Company Directors. He is a member of the Club of Rome.

Links

• A big majority of Australians say Malcolm Turnbull is doing little or nothing about climate change
• Deputy prime minister Barnaby Joyce faces the reality of climate change
• When should we worry about climate change?
• Climate Change Authority report recommending 'a mandatory carbon price' held back until after election
• Election 2016: Climate change policy a vote winner for majority of Australians

El Nino Over, Bom Says, So Winter Rain Could Be On The Way

ABC News

El Nino has contributed to drought conditions over much of Queensland. (ABC News: Chrissy Arthur, file photo)

The latest El Nino cycle is over, which could lead to a wet winter, according to the Bureau of Meteorology (BoM).

Key points: El Nino events cause extensive warming of the Pacific Ocean This leads to lower-than-average rainfall and periods of higher temperatures across Australia El Nino events occur every three to six years

The bureau's modelling shows ocean surface temperatures across the tropical Pacific have cooled to neutral levels over the past fortnight.
Waters beneath the surface have also cooled.
Forecaster Michael Knepp said conditions were back to neutral and the bureau was now on La Nina watch.
During La Nina events, rainfall in winter and spring is above average over northern, central and eastern Australia.
"[There's] a greater than 50 per cent chance that we might be in La Nina conditions later in the year," Mr Knepp said.
"That's not a certain thing, just something to keep an eye on over the next few months."
International climate models indicate the tropical Pacific Ocean will continue to cool.
Six of eight models suggest La Nina is likely to form during winter.
Mr Knepp said more rainfall could be expected across the region if predictions were correct, but the outlook accuracy at this time of year was low.

El Nino contributes to drought conditions
El Nino has contributed to drought conditions over the majority of Queensland. Currently, 85 per cent of Queensland is drought declared.
Queensland grazier Peter Whip said the prolonged drought had been devastating for farmers.
Mr Whip, whose property is south of Longreach, said winter rainfall was better than nothing.
"You either want a lot or none," he said.
"It can actually do more harm than good because if we have got a little bit of dry feed from the summer rain.
"Sometimes with that winter rain, if we get 50 points, it can actually wreck the feed you've got."

Rainfall deficiency across Australia
The bureau said almost the entire western half of Victoria was experiencing severe rainfall deficiency.
The rainfall deficiency in Tasmania covers much of the state.
Areas of serious to severe deficiency remain through inland Queensland and into northern New South Wales.
Large areas of South Australia and Western Australia are also experiencing serious rainfall deficiency.

Australian has been in the grip of El Nino for a year. (Supplied: Bureau of Meterology)

Links

• NSW ranked worst state for renewable energy in Climate Council report
• Poland begins logging primeval forest despite activist pleas

A Big Majority Of Australians Say Malcolm Turnbull Is Doing Little Or Nothing About Climate Change

Fairfax - Matt Wade

Two-thirds of voters say the Turnbull government is doing "not very much" or "nothing at all" to combat climate change.
And they are not alone – exclusive international polling for Fairfax Media shows a similar proportion in 22 other nations think their governments are doing little or nothing to address global warming.

Damselfish in a degraded habitat in the northern part of the Great Barrier Reef Photo: Supplied

Climate change has featured little in federal election campaign so far but the new poll results point to widespread voter dissatisfaction with current policies.
In Australia, just 4 per cent said the government was doing "a great deal" to address climate change and 19 per cent said it was doing "a fair amount." But more than half (52 per cent) said the government was doing not very much and 14 per cent nothing at all.
The results were consistent across Australian age groups and income groups although those living in cities were a little more likely to say the government was doing a fair amount to address climate change than those in regional areas.

Photo: Jessica Shapiro

A separate study of public opinions about climate change by the Ipsos polling firm, to be released soon, found most Australians think it is already causing an increase in extreme natural events. Ipsos' figures show 61 per cent think climate change is causing more frequent and/or extreme droughts while 59 per cent think it is causing more frequent and/or extreme bushfires and storms. The polling also found 56 per cent of Australians think climate change is contributing to the destruction of the Great Barrier Reef.
"The majority of us buy the argument that climate change is having a serious impact on our natural environment and our weather systems," said Ipsos director, Jessica Elgood.
There is less voter consensus about the scope of climate change policies with 32 per cent saying the government should take whatever actions necessary even if it harms economic growth versus 34 per cent saying climate change action should not harm growth. Only 6 per cent think governments should take no action at all.
"Most of us think something has to be done, the question is the scale of that response," Ms Elgood said.
Labor has attacked Malcolm Turnbull over claims he has watered down his personal commitment to strong action on climate change since becoming Prime Minister to appease the right wing of his party.
The Turnbull government has adopted a target set while Tony Abbott was Prime Minister to reduce carbon emissions by up to 28 per cent by 2020, based on 2005 figures. Environmental groups have criticised this for being too modest. Labor has announced a far more ambitious emissions reduction target but Mr Turnbull says it will result in "much higher" electricity prices for consumers.
The international survey of more than 16,500 people across 23 countries for Fairfax by the Ipsos Global @dvisor​, found half of all respondents believed their national government was doing "not very much" to address climate change and another fifth said their government was doing "nothing at all" about it. Only 5 per cent of the international sample thought their government was doing "a great deal", while 19 per cent said "a fair amount" was being done.
Peru had the highest proportion saying the government was doing little or nothing (93 per cent) followed by Mexico and Spain (both 88 per cent).
In the US 54 per cent said the government was doing not very much or nothing at to combat climate change compared with 38 per cent who said a great deal or a fair amount was being done.
Only two countries of the 23 had a majority who said their government was doing a great deal or a fair amount about climate change - Saudi Arabia and India.


Video: How to debunk myths

Debunking the myths and misinformation surrounding climate change is an important field for scientists, who must be careful not to reinforce the myths.

Links

• El Nino officially comes to end
• Burning all fossil fuels would 'cook' Earth, raise temperatures 8 degrees: study
• When should we worry about climate change?
• 'It just rocketed up there'

Climate Scientists Are Now Grading Climate Journalism

The Guardian - Daniel Nethery* | Emmanuel Vincent*

Climate Feedback provides a venue for climate scientists to evaluate the accuracy of climate news stories

F grade and a sad smilie, written in red letters in a spiral pad. Photograph: Alamy

The internet represents an extraordinary opportunity for democracy. Never before has it been possible for people from all over the world to access the latest information and collectively seek solutions to the challenges which face our planet, and not a moment too soon: the year 2015 was the hottest in human history, and the Great Barrier Reef is suffering the consequences of warming oceans right now.
Yet despite the scientific consensus that global warming is real and primarily due to human activity, studies show that only about half the population in some countries with among the highest CO₂ emissions per capita understand that human beings are the driving force of our changing climate. Even fewer people are aware of the scientific consensus on this question. We live in an information age, but the information isn't getting through. How can this be?
While the internet puts information at our fingertips, it has also allowed misinformation to sow doubt and confusion in the minds of many of those whose opinions and votes will determine the future of the planet. And up to now scientists have been on the back foot in countering the spread of this misinformation and pointing the public to trustworthy sources of information on climate change.
Climate Feedback intends to change that. It brings together a global network of scientists who use a new web-annotation platform to provide feedback on climate change reporting. Their comments, which bring context and insights from the latest research, and point out factual and logical errors where they exist, remain layered over the target article in the public domain. You can read them for yourself, right in your browser. The scientists also provide a score on a five-point scale to let you know whether the article is consistent with the science. For the first time, Climate Feedback allows you to check whether you can trust the latest breaking story on climate change.

An example of Climate Feedback in action. Scientists' comments and ratings appear as a layer over the article. Text annotated with Hypothesis is highlighted in yellow in the web browser and scientists' comments appear in a sidebar next to the article. Illustration: Climate Feedback

Last year the scientists looked at some influential content. Take the Pope's encyclical, for instance. The scientists gave those parts of the encyclical relating to climate science a stamp of approval. Other "feedbacks," as we call them, have made a lasting impact. When the scientists found that an article in The Telegraph misrepresented recent research by claiming that the world faced an impending ice age, the newspaper issued a public correction and substantially modified the online text.
But there's more work to be done. Toward the end of the year the scientists carried out a series of evaluations of some of Forbes magazine's reporting on climate change. The results give an idea of the scale of the problem we're tackling. Two of the magazine's most popular articles for 2015, one of which attracted almost one million hits, turned out to be profoundly inaccurate and misleading. Both articles, reviewed by nine and twelve scientists, unanimously received the lowest possible scientific credibility rating. This rarely occurs, and just in case you're wondering, yes, the scientists do score articles independently: ratings are only revealed once all scientists have completed their review.
We argue that scientists have a moral duty to speak up when they see misinformation masquerading as science. Up to now scientists have however had little choice but to engage in time-consuming op-ed exchanges, which result in one or two high-profile scientists arguing against the views of an individual who may have no commitment to scientific accuracy at all. Climate Feedback takes a different approach. Our collective reviews allow scientists from all over the world to provide feedback in a timely, effective manner. We then publish an accessible synthesis of their responses, and provide feedback to editors so that they can improve the accuracy of their reporting.
We've got proof of concept. Now we need to scale up, and for that we need the support of everyone who values accuracy in reporting on one of the most critical challenges facing our planet. Climate Feedback won't reach its full potential until we start measuring the credibility of news outlets in a systematic way. We want to be in a position to carry out an analysis of any influential internet article on climate change. We want to develop a 'Scientific Trust Tracker' – an index of how credible major news sources are when it comes to climate change.
We're all increasingly relying on the internet to get our news. But the internet has engendered a competitive media environment where in the race to attract the most hits, sensational headlines can trump sober facts. We're building into the system a new incentive for journalists with integrity to get ahead. Some journalists are already coming to us, asking our network of scientists to look at their work. We want readers to know which sources they can trust. We want editors to think twice before they publish ideological rather than evidence-based reporting on global warming.
On Friday 22 April 2016, more than 170 countries signed the Paris climate agreement. But this unprecedented international treaty will lead to real action only if the leaders of those countries can garner popular support for the measures needed to curb greenhouse gas emissions. The fate of the Paris deal lies largely in the hands of voters in democratic countries, and we cannot expect democracies to produce good policy responses to challenges of climate change if voters have a confused understanding of reality.
Scientists from all over the world are standing up for better informed democracies. You can help them make their voices heard. We invite you to stand with us for a better internet. We invite you to stand with science.

*Daniel Nethery is the associate editor and *Emmanuel Vincent is the founder of Climate Feedback. Climate Feedback is launching a crowdfunding campaign today. To support this initiative please visit the campaign page.



Links

• A Scientific Reference to Reliable Information on Climate Change
• Climate Feedback: A guide to reliable climate news
• Scientists are fact-checking climate journalism now
• Climate Feedback site allows scientists to correct media errors

What Will It Take For People To Care About Climate Change?

New Statesman - Laurie Penny

A record-breaking heat wave in Rajasthan reveals how badly we lack the necessary infrastructure to cope with the human suffering climate change is already causing.

The question of whether or not climate change is real is rapidly becoming less urgent than what can be done to alleviate the human suffering it is causing. In Rajasthan, north-west India this week, the mercury hit 51 degrees celsius (123°F). That's the hottest temperature on record in the country. Hospitals are swamped with patients suffering heatstroke and dehydration. The year's harvest is shrivelling in the ground. People are cooking to death on public transport. Yesterday, a camel left alone in the sun went mad and chewed its owner's head off. That's how hot it is in Rajasthan right now.
In rural areas, where there is no electricity, no fresh water, nothing to cool you but the breeze, citizens are demanding that the government take responsibility and offer relief, provide shelter, water and basic cooling facilities. That's the sort of heroism that should be unnecessary in the middle of a heatwave: it takes enough energy to lobby local bureaucracy at the best of times, let alone when it's hot enough that livestock have become homicidal.
I've been obsessed with this story for days, because it's my personal nightmare. I loathe the heat. The cold, at least, can usually be escaped; heat leaves me drained and frightened. I can't sleep under duvets. I become a limp dishrag in summer, and temperatures of over thirty degrees celsius regularly see me with my head in an open refrigerator, cursing my grandparents' decision to become citizens of a country that does not consider air conditioning a necessary artefact of civilisation. But air conditioning is also upsetting: when the merciful roar of the high-energy unit kicks in, you can practically hear the sizzling fossil fuels soothing you with the cool breeze of complicity. In the heat, all I can do is overthink. I would not cope in Rajasthan. I can barely cope with Brighton in July.
The British national sport of complaining about the weather is becoming increasingly insensitive. After three centuries of merrily conquering other nations and building bonfires out of their resources to light our way to a place of power in a burning world, we are still inhabiting one of the only landmasses where the weather isn't actively trying to kill us all the time. Pleasant as it is to carp and moan every time the temperature moves outside the ten-degree range I happen to find comfortable, the temperate, drizzle-through-the-sunshine British climate is pretty much as good as it gets, on a global scale. In fact, on that same global scale, Britain has some claim for having had the most benefit out of fossil fuels for the least climate cost. If we're not going to cough up reparations, the least we can do is stop whining.
I mention all this for two reasons. Firstly, because the manifestations and implications of climate change are frightening wherever you happen to live, and I find sprinkle of weak humour makes the whole thing bearable, makes me less likely to panic and tap out of the entire discussion as something that's not relevant to me right now because for the meantime, at least, I'm comfy indoors and it's raining outside.
Secondly, because when the lives and livelihoods of so many are at stake – when the topic for discussion is not tens or thousands but millions of people actually cooking in the unnatural heat – you run into a phenomenon that rationalists call "scope insensitivity". Let's say that my nightmare is overwhelming, inescapable heat. I can imagine, viscerally, physically, how it might feel to be trapped in a 51 degree outdoor oven. I can be scared and outraged that there are no emergency shelters being built, no cool water on offer, that so little is being done to alleviate that suffering, when I picture one, or two, or ten strangers sweltering through it.
But the knowledge that the population of Rajasthan is 73.5 million does not make me 73.5 million times as frightened outraged. My heart cannot hold that much heat-terror. That's not how the human heart is designed. And that's what scope insensitivity is: on a species level, it is psychologically extremely difficult to summon the appropriate level of empathy and translate that empathy into action.
That doesn't mean it's not useful – vital – to try. Our understanding of urgency has got to scale up. Any useful response to the growing climate crisis will require precisely the sort of collective action on a global, state and local level that neoliberal governments around the world have turned their faces from, either actively destroying the necessary infrastructure to cope with human suffering or refusing to build it in the first place. In a burning world, the time has surely come for lifesaving infrastructure in which everyone is invested.
As climate change becomes a reality for billions of people all over the world, what are the demands going to be? In Rajasthan, the immediate need is obvious: for tents, cold water, more reliable electricity, contingency plans to deal with coming food shortages, and better provision of amenities for rural communities. The longer-term need is much like everyone else's: for the governments of the world to earmark enough resources to tackle the human effects of the inhuman weather we're all going to be suffering through in the decades to come.
The question is no longer whether man-made climate change is actually a thing that's happening. That's not because the issue has been resolved in the minds of evangelical naysayers and their fuel tycoon besties. It's because if you're standing in front of a burning house, the issue of who lit the match can be tabled for the meantime, while we decide how to get the kids out.

Links

• Why we fear terrorism more than climate change
• How "cli-fi" novels humanise the science of climate change
• The time to act on climate change is now
• Climate change is here, it's real, and we need to do something about it
• The world's worst climate change villains? Step forward, prime ministers of Australia and Canada
• "Climate doubters": Associated Press changes the way it refers to climate change deniers

Why Has Climate Change Disappeared From The Australian Election Radar?

The Conversation - David Holmes

AAP/Lukas Coch

Two weeks into a protracted election campaign, it is looking ever-more likely that climate change is to be placed way down the order of business – at least for the major parties.
The contest over climate change that characterised the previous three elections seems to have disappeared off the political radar despite the issue being more urgent than ever. Since the Paris climate summit, global average temperatures continue to break month-on-month records.
Just a few weeks after the summit, the North Pole was briefly not even able to reach freezing point – in the middle of winter. And just this month, Cape Grim surpassed a 400 ppm baseline minimum.
Then there is the truly frightening climate spiral developed by Ed Hawkins from the University of Reading. It shows what an El Niño amplified global temperature has climbed to. The spiral assumes a tight-knit but ever-expanding ball until April 2015, when the spiral line starts to separate dramatically from the ball. This year it careers dangerously close to the 1.5℃ threshold.

Climate spiral. Ed Hawkins

The diminishing political and media spiral on climate
While global temperatures may be spiralling out of control, the opposite appears to be happening with the climate issue attention cycle in Australia.
Apparently, climate is less important than jobs and growth – or, in Labor's case, health and schools.
A big part of this change in political climates is undoubtedly the Paris summit itself. The political triumphalism of the summit belies the scientific pessimism of so many climate scientists and activists.
Kevin Anderson from Manchester University's Tyndall Centre for Climate Change Research even declared the summit to be "worse that Copenhagen", in that it is based on out-of-date science, does not include aviation and shipping, and includes negative emissions in its scenarios for achieving abatement.
On the other hand, after the collapse of talks at Copenhagen, some activists see no choice but to climb aboard with the Paris agreement, insofar as it at least signifies a mainstream seachange in action – even if the actual measures are inadequate. The INDCs that came out of the conference still put the world on a path to 3.5℃.
Yet so many politicians from around the globe have sought to convince their constituents that the climate problem is all but solved. The Coalition is banking on such a sell to the Australian electorate as it gambles with a climate attention minimisation strategy. Much of this sell has been left to the "best minister in the world" Greg Hunt, both before and after the Paris summit.
Hunt has already claimed success on meeting the 2020 target, and with strategies to meet the 2030 target.
Little of the Government's progress in meeting the 2020 target is due to reducing emissions. Rather it has been the reduction in land-clearing, consumer-driven domestic solar, and the decline in manufacturing that have been decisive in meeting the 2020 targets.
The Guardian's Lenore Taylor has pointed out that while the Coalition is bringing back the "carbon tax" scare campaign of 2013, its own scheme would have to draw on the "safeguard mechanism" component of Direct Action – which is itself a disguised ETS – to have any chance of meeting the targets.
Short of leaning on this mechanism, the only other option the Coalition has is to increase the taxpayer-funded emissions reduction fund to a level that would make a mockery of any claims to budget responsibility.
Add to this the fact that recent academic research on Direct Action has reaffirmed its status as a form of corporate welfare that is allocated to projects that would have happened anyway. And all this is in an Australia that has increased its already high emissions 3% since 2000.

Shifting voter attitudes on climate
But have Hunt's strategies worked on the Australian electorate? Not according to a recent ReachTEL poll of 2,400 respondents on May 9, which revealed that 56% believed the government needed to do more to tackle global warming.
64% said they would be more likely to vote for a party that has a plan to source 100% of Australia's electricity from renewable sources like wind, solar and hydro in the next 20 years.
Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull seems to have switched off his personal barometer on climate as an issue that is too politically fraught. In 2010, he said:

We know that the consequences of unchecked global warming would be catastrophic … We as a human species have a deep and abiding obligation to this planet and to the generations that will come after us.

But since then, Turnbull appears to have sacrificed his convictions to the climate-illiterate backbench of his party.
Labor has not done much better. While it has more ambitious 2030 abatement targets than the Coalition, it has been particularly silent in reminding voters of its climate policy alternative.

Labor and the Greens
Both major parties have opted to entrench their duopoly by not going after big targets on any of the issues that are usually recycled at election time.
Instead, much airtime has been spent in the opening weeks of the campaign attacking the Greens. Liberal ministers take every opportunity to pillory any alliance between the Greens and Labor. Last week, Finance Minister Mathias Cormann told Fairfax Media:

We see them very much on a unity ticket. In our judgement, Labor and the Greens are now on an anti-business, anti-jobs, and anti-growth unity ticket.

In the same week, Turnbull labelled Labor's proposal to double the intake of refugees as a "gesture to the Greens" on the back of Immigration Minister Peter Dutton's attack on the Greens' asylum-seeker policy.
But, curiously, Labor and the Greens are at war themselves, or at least they are desperately giving the appearance they are. According to Michael Cooney from the Labor thinktank the Chifley Research Centre and Ben Oquist from the Australia Institute, Labor and the Greens have attacked each other because nearly every inner-city seat the Greens have a chance of winning for the first time are Labor-held.
The Greens are also distancing themselves from Labor because they want to capture the anti-politics vote. This is best achieved by showing yourself to be radically different from the major parties.
Labor, on the other hand, is almost forced into attacking the Greens because of the long-run stigma that News Corp papers have attached to any such alliance. During the first days of the election campaign, the Daily Telegraph and The Australian were jumping in with stories that no major party would ever form government with the Greens.
In contrast to the 2013 election campaign, the Tele even had a pro-Labor story "Save Our Albo" over the Greens' challenge to Anthony Albanese's inner-city seat of Grayndler.
But nothing much has changed. Back in the 2010 federal election, the The Australian declared the pride with which it had smashed any alliance between the Greens and Labor, and that the Greens:

… should be destroyed at the ballot box.

In October the same year Rupert Murdoch referred to the "bloody Greens" as a party that would ruin Australia's economic prosperity.
What is clear to the Coalition, Murdoch, and big business in Australia is that Labor and the Greens must be permanently isolated from each other in a sustained ideological crusade. Failing to achieve this would spell nothing short of game over for the Coalition.
The entire crusade, which is based on castigating the Greens as a loony left party that would bring down the Labor Party, requires so much journalistic theatre, compared to what could more easily be done with the Liberal-National Party marriage of convenience. One is a party of agrarian socialists, and the other a party serving mining capital and finance capital. But News Corp has been particularly disciplined at ignoring any of the tensions that these parties have had over the years.
Were Labor to form an alliance with the Greens it could take great leadership on climate. But there are a great many forces arraigned against them achieving a left-progressive coalition.
Whether the Labor Party has the courage to come out and challenge the Coalition to a contest over climate remains to be seen.
The Greens, for their part, are making many more inroads into this election than the last. They certainly have the strongest climate policy, with a renewable energy target of 90% by 2030. The ReachTEL poll referred to earlier shows the Greens have four times the primary vote than the National Party.
The Greens know that for under 30 voters they are already matching the primary vote of the major parties, and that a core platform of strong action against global warming is a big part of this support. Whether the major parties can ignore this support that springs from climate will be one of the biggest gambles of this election.

Links

• Election 2016: Climate Politics Off To A Chilly Start, But Could Still Heat Up
• Lethal Heating: Election 2016 Policy Primer: The Environment
• Direct Action Not Giving Us Bang For Our Buck On Climate Change